In a contest of musical chairs with several former city officials, local developer Randy Wang is the only person still in the game.

Wang’s 2008 accusations that city officials demanded bribes in exchange for support of his $75 million Temple City Piazza project has led to the political downfall of former Councilwoman Judy Wong, ex-mayor Cathe Wilson and former Councilman David Capra in the city’s largest corruption case.

Wang, who testified that he paid more than $20,000 to these ex-officials, has not been accused or indicted of any crime over the issue and is moving forward with plans to develop the 3.8-acre site that has been at the center of the bribery scandal.

Wang’s attorney says he’s done nothing wrong and prosecutors say he has not asked for or received immunity.

“Mr. Wang was not our primary focus because he was not a public official,” said Max Huntsman, the Los Angeles County deputy district attorney that was assigned to the case in the public integrity division until recently. “He provided us tapes of public officials allegedly committing bribery … That was something of such great significance and something we needed his testimony on. Investigating his culpability was less of an issue because we needed his cooperation and got his cooperation” in prosecuting the public officials.

“We’ve gotten questions before at our (council) meetings, on occasion, about `why hasn’t the DA (district attorney) looked into his actions?”‘ Councilman Tom Chavez said. “Whether there should be any actions taken against him, we can’t answer that.”

Temple City Councilman Vincent Yu asked if Wang was “a victim or perpetrator?”

“(No one knows) all the facts and the facts won’t be known unless it’s contested in court and unfortunately, we may not get to see that,” Yu said.

Wong, 54, who resigned from her council seat in March, pleaded no contest in May to 10 felony counts of bribery, solicitation of bribery and perjury charges. Wang accused her in grand jury testimony last year of accepting six bribes totaling about $13,000.

In addition to Wong, Wang had accused Wilson, Capra and former council candidate, Scott Carwile, of demanding bribes in return for their support of the Piazza project on the developer’s property at Las Tunas Drive and Rosemead Boulevard.

Former Mayor Wong, who had previously vowed to fight the charges in court, is scheduled to be sentenced on July 22 and now faces up to 16 months in state prison.

Wilson, who is due in court for a pre-trial hearing on July 23, is charged with receiving $10,000 in cash from Wang’s former project manager, Jay Liyanage. Wilson, 77, is also charged with lying under oath.

It is not known whether Wilson, who maintains her innocence and lost her re-election bid last year, will go to trial or plead no contest like Wong, her lawyer said.

Capra, who was accused of taking $5,000 in unreported donations from developer Wang, pleaded guilty to a misdemeanor campaign finance violation last summer and resigned from office.

Prosecutors would not have known about the case if Wang had not taped some of his conversations with officials and produced the tapes, Huntsman said. While Wang had a personal motive since he was involved in a counter lawsuit against Temple City officials over his project, he never once asked for immunity from prosecutors, Huntsman said.

“He just provided the evidence and was cooperative and that’s unusual for people involved in an investigation of this kind,” Huntsman said. “I think his cooperation without any strings attached is significant when you analyze what his state of mind is in doing all of this.”

The city sued Wang in April 2008, claiming the developer was dragging his feet on his project. Wang countersued the following September.

Just because a private party pays a public official doesn’t mean necessarily that he intended to bribe him or her, Huntsman said.

“It’s possible for a public official to be bribed and to receive a bribe corruptly, without a private party having really intended to bribe them, or they were extorted into it” against their will, Huntsman said.

Wang’s civil attorney, Patrick J. Duffy III, said Wang only made legal payments, as far as the developer was concerned.

“Other people solicited bribes from him and took money that was supposed to be for campaign contributions apparently for other purposes,” his attorney said. “The only thing they asked for is a campaign contribution, for which they didn’t promise to do anything.”

Wang said he began to get nervous when officials asked for cash payments.

“The reason I was uncomfortable was because, number one, if I did not follow what they wanted me to do, they may take my family property away,” Wang said, according to a grand jury transcript of his testimony in 2009. “However, if I did follow what they wanted me to do, I don’t know, I didn’t know if it was legal or illegal.”

Wang said he started recording his conversations with Wong in January of 2007 after he gave the councilwoman $5,000 in cash.

“I felt uncomfortable not knowing what would happen after I give the cash out, and I didn’t know what would happen to my project,” he testified.

Wang’s 2008 lawsuit portrays the developer as a “handicapped local resident whose primary language is not English” that was taken advantage of by the city.

While Wang has not been accused of a crime, Liyanage, his former project manager, pleaded guilty last spring to a felony charge of giving bribes to Wong, Wilson and Capra in 2006. His sentencing is pending and he will face no jail time if he testifies truthfully in Wilson’s trial.

Carwile, the former city council candidate, was also accused of taking $3,000 in unreported donations from Wang and pleaded guilty on July 23 to one felony count of perjury. He, too, will face no jail time if he testifies truthfully in Wilson’s trial, Huntsman said.

Temple City officials reached a settlement agreement in February that ended the nearly two-year legal battle with Wang and voided all previous deals between the two entities.

Wang’s latest plan for the property calls for about 50,000 square feet of single-story retail space in a scaled-down version of his original multi-level, mixed-use proposal that was more than double the size.

That project, now dubbed Temple City Plaza, still needs to come before the Planning Commission and a new City Council, which has no ties to the corruption scandal.

“If we ever sign a contract or development agreement with Randy or whoever, we will honor that,” Yu said.

Brenda Gazzar is a multilingual multimedia reporter who has worked for a variety of news outlets in California and in the Middle East since 2000. She has covered a range of issues, including breaking news, immigration, law and order, race, religion and gender issues, politics, human interest stories and education. Besides the Los Angeles Daily News and its sister papers, her work has been published by Reuters, the Denver Post, Ms. Magazine, the Jerusalem Post, USA Today, the Christian Science Monitor, the Los Angeles Jewish Journal, The Cairo Times and others. Brenda speaks Spanish, Hebrew and intermediate Arabic and is the recipient of national, state and regional awards, including a National Headliners Award and one from the Associated Press News Executives' Council. She holds a dual master's degree in Communications/Middle Eastern Studies from the University of Texas at Austin.

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